Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Netflix hikes prices 60 percent

Bye bye Netflix streaming. Do write again when you have a more robust library and maybe we'll talk:

We are separating unlimited DVDs by mail and unlimited streaming into two separate plans to better reflect the costs of each. Now our members have a choice: a streaming only plan, a DVD only plan, or both.

Your current $9.99 a month membership for unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs will be split into 2 distinct plans:

That's the rub, isn't it? The streaming selection isn't robust enough to justify this price increase in my opinion, but I suspect Netflix's hand has been forced by the content providers, who having finally realized that people would like to choose when and where they want to view movies and television shows, are eager to squeeze every last dime from all of us and are likely forcing an enormous price hike on Netflix for the right to carry their content.

The only way this won't turn out to be a huge setback for Netflix will be if the company is able to leverage more streaming content out of the providers in exchange for the increased carriage fees. Time will tell. In the meantime, it's time to give Hulu Plus another look.

Guessing they may limit the DVD selection now by title and/or availability to encourage people to have both services. I rarely use streaming. Probably a lot of people could do without it, as DVDs have more features and the usually short wait to get a disc never bothers me. They will lose that revenue now.

Hulu Plus is laden with commercials, isn't that the benefit of time-shifting in the digital age? No TV is worth any of these prices. No one is mentioning the movie selection though, which is good. I'm in for the movies, and sticking around until greencine.com gets prices competitive.

I don't get it -- what was everyone else paying before the price DROP -- you know when they offered unlimited streaming on its own. We went for the almost $20 3 dvds at a time (with streaming) to the half of that 1 dvd and streaming.

I remember thinking, well, this isn't going to last forever, but at least I'll take the bargain while I can. $16 is still less than we'd paid for before and having 1 dvd is really not much different than 3 dvds.

Unbelieveable. I find it hard to believe that the selection of old movies, documentaries and oddities that they offer in their streaming selection costs them all that much. Not that there's not plenty I'd be happy to watch there, but I doubt that studios are that concerned about the money they lose when somebody watches Notorious.

We've been subscribers for a few years, and it was the one company that I actually enjoyed doing business with. I thought that their customer service was second to none. I recommended it to anybody who asked. Now, from Sept. 1 of last year to Sept. 1 of this year, our price will have increased 78%, if we were to stick with the plan we had (which we won't). Plus, for new movies, I believe you have to wait 28 days before they're even available, compared to when they are actually released on DVD.

We don't really use the streaming option that much, but it was nice to have. Not sure what we'll do when this new deal takes effect, but I do know that, for popular new releases, at least, Redbox is a very competitive option.

I'm not privy to all the economic factors that go into these decisions, but it seems to me that they've shot themselves in the foot here, and could at least have offered some kind of discount for a one dvd / streaming combo.

Netflix’s pricing changes are no surprise, given the industry is evolving towards a pure digital distribution paradigm and streaming services are at the front and center for video entertainment of all kinds. Consumers have been interested in a la carte selections for a while. Streaming finally allows them to reach the goal of building their own bundled or a la carte set of offerings.

Consumers are looking to build packages that consist of services for mainstream films, television viewing, live sporting events and independent, classic and foreign films, which is where Fandor comes into the picture.

Fandor’s streaming subscription service is one that offers a professionally curated selection of independent and international films. Fandor gives film lovers instant, streaming access to rare and limited release films and the opportunity to be active patrons of the arts by supporting independent filmmakers and the community that surrounds them.

ZORN REPLY-- Though this posting looks an awful lot like cut and past spam, I'll leave it up primarily to call rubbish on it: Consumers are looking for "independent, classic and foreign films"? And this is your business model? Dream on, "Fandor." Will look for you in the internet-startup obits real soon. Good day.

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